Angry Ryanair passengers revolt and ‘pillage’ aircraft

Scores of angry passengers on a Ryanair flight from Morocco to Paris “took the plane hostage” after a five-hour delay and a diversion to Nantes in western France, where they had to spend a night.

According to French daily Metronews, the plane, carrying 170 people on January 11,was forced to drop off a sick passenger in Madrid en route to Paris.

Because of night-time noise restrictions at Paris’s Beauvais airport, the aircraft was forced to stop in Nantes.

The passengers, told they would be taken to Paris by bus the following day, rebelled and decided to help themselves to the aircraft’s onboard supplies.

One Nantes airport employee told "Metronews" some of the passengers behaved “extremely disrespectfully”.

“The plane and its crew were effectively taken hostage by a group of disgruntled passengers,” the unnamed source said. “They pillaged the aircraft for food, drinks – especially alcoholic drinks – cigarettes and perfumes; anything of any value. They behaved like animals towards the plane, the crew members and members of the airport’s ground staff.”

One passenger, again unnamed, defended their actions: “I’m neither a thief nor a hostage-taker. We were tired, on edge because the situation was badly managed, we were hungry and thirsty and no one was giving us any information.

“After seven hours locked in a plane – instead of the scheduled two-and-a-half – people need to eat,” said another, who insisted that only a minority of the passengers took non-essential items. “We simply helped ourselves.”